Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Rutgers Evolution Seminar: for the benthic foraminifera folks

From today's Evolution_RU Digest, via Dr. Lena Struwe

Rutgers Evolution Seminar - Fall 2013

Seminar in Micropaleontology
3-credit course


Micropaleontology is a vast subject, which can roughly be defined as
encompassing all fossil groups whose study requires use of a
microscope.It includes planktonic and benthic organisms, from
unicellular as well as multicellular eukaryotes.In this seminar we will
restrict our objectives to the planktonic calcareous microfossils, i.e.,
planktonic foraminifera and coccolithophores, both of which
contribute(d) tremendously to the dynamics of the Earth system.

Micropaleontology is also truly at the crossroads of multiple
disciplines in Earth Sciences, and this seminar is designed as an
introduction to the diversity of scientific topics addressed by
micropaleontologists, from paleoceanography to sequence stratigraphy, to
time scale(s), to microevolutionary processes, to mass extinction, among
others.Each week we will discuss one major scientific topic, although
emphasis will be placed on evolutionary processes (e.g., co-evolution,
trends, functional morphology, mass extinction).One cannot understand
the paleontological record without knowledge of the living
organisms.Therefore we will begin the seminar with a review of selected
papers dealing with the biology and physiology of the calcareous
microplankton.

Students will be expected to read papers and discuss data and ideas in
them.They will also be expected to present syntheses of ideas expressed
by different authors.

This is a 3-credit seminar.We will meet in two sessions of your choice

Tuesday morning (10-11.30)

Wednesday afternoon (3?4.30 p.m.)

Thursday morning (10?11.30).

A survey as to your preference will be circulated to be returned no
later than August 29.

I look forward to interesting discussions with you.

Dr. Marie-Pierre Aubry

Aubry@rci.rutgers.edu




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